A little Texas history

Monday

Feb 24, 2014 at 7:32 AM

By Jonathan Cannon

By Jonathan Cannon

Herald Democrat

I once heard a story from a college friend who isn’t from Texas about a conversation they had with one of my fellow Texas natives. My friend, who grew up in Oklahama, said the Texas native was surprised when the Okie didn’t know all about the story of the Alamo.

"Didn’t you have Texas history in school?" the Texan asked.

"No. We took Oklahoma history," the Okie replied.

I like to think that the majority of us Texans are a bit more thoughtful about what we say, but we do certainly have a lot of pride in our state. And rightly so I would say.

Let’s look at the Alamo for a minute. A battle where a few hundred men who believed in what they were fighting for so much decided to stay and fight even if it meant their almost certain doom.

If you’re from Texas, it’s a story you almost certainly know well. It was on this day, 177 years ago that Col. William Travis called for help from the few men who were under siege at the Alamo. In one of the pleas for help he addressed it to "The People of Texas and All Americans in the World," and signed it with now-famous phrase "Victory or Death."

While the battle, even from the very beginning, was doomed, it became a battle cry from the rest of the Texas revolution. "Remember the Alamo," soldiers would cry as they went into later fights until Texas officially became an independent republic on May 14, 1836.

That’s not something the men at the Alamo could know. For all they knew their stand would go unnoticed, and they would be forgotten. Still they chose to stand, because it was what they felt was right.

C.S. Lewis said, "Integrity is doing the right thing, even when no one is watching." It’s tough to do sometimes when the wrong way seems so easy.

I think there’s another side of this that may be just as important. Often times it’s easy to decide those who disagree with us are either stupid, greedy or downright evil. I’ll leave you with a quote from Socrates: "The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing."